Seven Hundred and Twenty Five to One
by Ryua Malfoy
Summary: Super short thing about Han and Luke locked out of the Rebel Base on Hoth. Came into my head, so I wrote it. Really only romantic in the background... I meant to write smut, but it never happened.


_Author's Note: Power-watching Star Wars, and this came into my head. It was supposed to be smut, and apparently instead it's a primer on how to survive deathly cold temperatures._

"Hang on kid... this may smell bad, but it'll keep you warm! Until I can get a shelter built..."

Even if he didn't have Luke to worry about, Han needed that shelter for himself. He'd lost feeling to his feet back while he was riding the stinking Taun Taun, and he'd stopped feeling his hands when the sun went down. His face burned like he'd been splashed with raw plasma. Finally, after what seemed like days of effort but was really probably no more than a half hour or so, Han had a cave dug in the snow, covered with chunks of drifted snow, packed in with yet more snow. He was too cold to do more than stick his transmitter to the top of the shelter, and hope it was enough to pick up on sensors in the morning.

The Taun Taun carcass barely even smelled anymore, and chunks of its flesh froze and broke as Han hauled Luke out of it. He couldn't feel if he was still warm or not, but at least the kid's body was pliable as he dragged and shoved him into the shelter. His emergency blanket was on the floor, and he crawled in , straddling Luke in an awkward, hunched position. The cave was only about two feet high, because it would take too long to build anything bigger, and they'd been told in basic survival training that smaller shelters heated faster anyway.

He started by stripping Luke's ice-encrusted gear. Between snow melt, his own blood, and the unmentionable oozings inside the Taun Taun, the dampness would sap what little heat he had left. Plus, they would really start to stink as they thawed, and so he shoved them outside with little ceremony. They'd freeze solid, and he could beat the ice out in the morning, assuming someone came to get them. The one good thing about this damn fool crusade was that the people REALLY looked out for each other.

Han's hands were clumsy and numb in the huge gloves, and he pulled them off with his teeth, working his pale, icy fingers, hoping they weren't actually frozen. He stuffed them inside his own jacket, relieved to feel painful pins and needles after a few minutes. Loosening his own gear so his body heat would start to ice up the inside of the tiny cave, he kept stripping, keeping Luke's cleaner, drier gear inside as he pulled it off of him. At least the kid was small enough to lift up easily.

He was disturbingly cold, although he did groan faintly when Han pulled the scarf off of his head, accidentally tearing off the dried blood stuck to his cheek. With Luke down to the basic thermal bodysuit nobody on this damned iceball took off, he stripped down the rest of his own outer clothes. With the shelter frozen in now except for the small air vent at their feet, it actually felt almost balmy. Certainly as warm as the quarters back at the base, and actually feeling more comfortable all the time. Still, hovering around the freezing point wasn't going to be enough for Luke, who was so hypothermic he wasn't even shivering, just laying there, breathing shallowly.

He swore, and shook out the second themal blanket, laying down beside him. Luke was cold enough it was like snuggling up to a snowbank, and so he kept swearing, because maybe it really could heat the air up. Eventually, the kid stopped feeling quite so icy, at least at his core. Realzing he'd better make sure he wasn't just freezing to death himself and getting used to the cold, Han reached down to grab Luke's foot. Still icy, but his chest and stomach were definitely starting to warm up, it wasn't just his wishful thinking.

"Should have just got off this frozen pile of poodoo," Han grumped, pulling Luke against him, drawing the limp arms and legs up againt his stomach. "But no, here I am, spooning this dumb kid with a hero complex... and he's not even awake enough to make it any fun." Han Solo might be a scoundrel, but he didn't mess with anyone unconscious enough to have no opinion on the matter.

Pity. That'd be a good way to heat things up a bit.

But when he woke up to crackling static and white light filtering down through the snow, Luke was insensate as ever, although at least he was shivering occasionally now. "Good morning. Nice of you guys to stop by," he replied, gruff tone covering his relief at Wedge's voice breaking through the static. He'd never admit it, but he'd never heard anything more beautiful. It was a bit of a scramble to get into his clothes and bundling Luke up in both blankets, but by the time he broke a small hole out of the end of the shelter and crawled out, a snowspeeder was just starting to circle down to the ground.

"Hey, you don't look so bad to me." Han said, covering up his worry with swagger. "In fact, you look strong enough to pull the ears off a gundark." The kid did look a little less like he was about to die, but thinner and paler, and he doubted those scars on his face were ever going to fade.

"Thanks to you," Luke said, and Han grinned, bending forwards, just a couple of inches between them.

"That's two you owe me, junior," he said, and Luke laughed, and Han was just about to lean forwards that little bit more when Leia swept in.

When she kissed the kid, he wasn't sure which one he was more jealous of. This was a stupid choice of careers. Smugglers got laid a lot more than resistance fighters.


End file.
